Chockstone Forum

      Sponsored By
      ROCK
   HARDWARE

Chockstone Photography

Australian Landscape Prints

Chockstone Forum - General Discussion

General Climbing Discussion

Author

Be alert not alarmed

NMcKinnon

7-Jan-2005
10:31:06 AM

Last night I tried bouldering at the bluestone wall near ScienceWorks in Spotswood. Sadly, I was interrupted by two of Victoria’s finest strapping beat cops in an unmarked car. Some very alert and upstanding community citizen had spotted me and decided to call 000 to report “someone climbing over the wall”.

I’d just finished telling my life story to these kind coppers, when a second, much flashier marked car showed up. We all had a lovely chat before the boys-in-blue adjourned to the local donut joint.

Anyway, I did achieve some climbing. The wall is about 70m in length but is relatively featureless compared to the Richmond Bridge bluestone. Continuous traversing is very difficult – I found one section about 10m in length at about V3. Longer link-ups will be much harder.

The ‘up’ problems are really the best feature of the wall. Someone has left painted markings like BS, BF, A, & C at various spots and these correspond to moderate up problems. Harder ‘up’ problems abound but most just involve desperate crimping. The landing is flat and grassy, with no risk of landing near the road. A crash mat is definitely recommended for up problems.

The easiest line is at the big horizontal slot in the middle of the wall. Climb up to the LH end of the slot, then up the left leading ‘crack’; it’s a bit dirty.

In sections the soft concrete grouting between the blocks is quite crumbling and should be avoided.

If police harassment isn’t your cup of tea – then just go to CliffHanger instead.

nmonteith

7-Jan-2005
10:37:05 AM

This reminds me of a certain bridge in Brisbane I developed with some school friends. Escaping from the boys in blue on a push bike with a genertor and a drill was quite an adrenaline rush...

tmarsh

7-Jan-2005
10:58:58 AM

I know the bridge you mean, Nick. It's nice and cool on summer afternoons, but that's about the best I can say. The up problems were pretty good from what I remember, but the traversing was F**ing difficult.

What's odd in this case is that the bluestone wall hides the ACI bottle glass dump. On the other side of the wall are piles and piles of broken glass. Why a 'concerned citizen' would be worried about someone climbing *into* a broken glass dump is beyond me...

Strangely enough, the only time I've been hassled by police climbing on man-made structures was climbing on the Supreme Court building. Silly of me, really.

tim

gfdonc

7-Jan-2005
12:05:40 PM

Also had to explain myself one night (long time back) setting up a traverse line on a wall in Collingwood .. turned out to be the side wall of the local school which they took exception to.
Had to demonstrate technique etc to convince them we were for real. Amusing.
- Steve

adski

7-Jan-2005
12:38:32 PM

Amusing indeed.
Cops moved us on from a McMahons Pt retaining wall telling us to 'go get pissed or something', nice.

kieranl

7-Jan-2005
12:49:08 PM

Years ago I was seriously hassled by police at Trinity Wall. Seems they had a report of indecent exposure which was probably Mark Moorhead or Carrigan changing for bouldering sessions while not wearing undies. That wasn't much fun at the time.

pomyrocks

7-Jan-2005
12:53:57 PM

heh nick, glad to see you keeping up relations with the local constabulary!!!

thanks for putting up the data on the bluestone wall. me and a mate work just around the corner from this site so we'll go and check it outsome time and provide some more feed back (if need be).

hopefully the "up" problems will be easier with 2 people.

cheers,

james

dalai

7-Jan-2005
12:57:30 PM

On 7/01/2005 kieranl wrote:
>Years ago I was seriously hassled by police at Trinity Wall. Seems they
>had a report of indecent exposure which was probably Mark Moorhead or Carrigan
>changing for bouldering sessions while not wearing undies. That wasn't
>much fun at the time.

Being hassled by police or seeing Moorhead and Carrigan nude?

I was hassled by Police once many years ago at Richmond Bridge. Some concerned citizen phoned in that someone was climbing up the wall in an attempt to commit suicide on the tracks above... Even though I was traversing and that you can walk up to the tracks easily rather than climb! Police were fine once I explained the training for climbing thing.

There are 8 messages in this topic.